Union Minister of State for Home, Kiren Rijiju said today people from Northeast would forfeit their right to speak about discrimination outside the region, if they discriminate people of other communities here in the northeast.
“Within the Northeast there shouldn’t be discrimination, or what right do we have to say people from the northeast shouldn’t be discriminated outside the northeast,” the Union Minister said while speaking at the Mega Arunachal Tribal Festival at the U So So Tham auditorium here.
He advised the students: “if you want your right you should know about your responsibilities. Nothing is one way traffic.” Terming racial discrimination as a “mental illness and the worst form of crime” he said, there would be now provisions in the Indian penal code to take “strong punitive action” against those who discriminates racially.
Touching on the large number of organizations and associations, he said, any State having a large number of such organizations indicates the State Government has failed in discharging its responsibilities and duties. “NGOs and associations are formed when people feel their grievances are not addressed by the Government. Such organizations indicate that the Government has failed,” he maintained.
He urged the students not to form too many organizations, as they are “not to do business here,” and said they should rather concentrate on their careers.
On the other hand, Rijiju said people from the northeast “need not feel frustrated and angry” when people outside the region remains ignorant about the people of the region as India is a huge Nation of 1.25 billion people.
“We may know about Mumbai, Delhi, UP and Bihar, but how much do we know about the people of Lakshadweep or say Daman and Diu. Sometimes it is not possible to know everything about the people of this huge Nation,” he stated.
Nonetheless he said the Central Government is taking steps to create awareness of the region and from next year all the text books of CBSE would have chapter on the northeast. “Right from nursery to the Ph.D level the CBSE and the UGC syllabus would have chapters on the Northeast,” he added.
Moreover, speaking about the often-repeated term “mainstream India,” Rijiju said: “people speak about the northeast merging with mainstream India, why can’t Delhi-Mumbai merge with the northeast?"
He stated Delhi is not the beginning of the Country; it is in the Centre of the Country and the Capital. “My State and the northeast is the beginning of the country as it borders several foreign Nations and the vanguard of the country. The region is also mainstream India,” he stated.
No comments:
Post a Comment